With Valentine’s Day a mere hop, skip, and a jump away (wasn’t it only just Christmas?!), many of us, myself included, are desperately scrambling for last minute gift ideas. The flexible folks over at Fitness First have come up with a novel way of getting your partner hot under the collar — one which requires nothing more than, well, a hop, skip, and a jump.
Subscribing to the mantra that ‘couples who work out together, stay together’ (I unsuccessfully tried to suggest the tongue twistier “couples that don’t work out together don’t work out”), the brand has designed a series of couple workouts that fitness team leader Tawfiq Chong has helpfully broken down into a set of step-by-step instructions. You’ll find these featured throughout the article, as well as a handy instructional video at the end to aid the visualization process.
But that’s not all: us writers here at Vulcan Post are intrepid explorers, willfully running the extra mile (purely metaphorically, please) in the name of journalistic endeavour. So when we found out that Tawfiq was in fact married to another Fitness First trainer, Naila, we had to get them together to find out more about couples cardio, and whether or not the exercise ball followed them home at night.
They met back in 2010 when they were both instructors at the same gym, where Tawfiq was immediately drawn to Naila’s passion for her dance classes and her “overall positive energy”. The couple wed four years later, and have motivated each other’s fitness pursuits ever since. “Having an exercise partner — or in our case, a life-long partner — to work out with helps you to stay motivated, keep track of your progress and celebrate successes together,” Naila explained.
Whilst the time each of them singularly spends in the gym each week would muscle out the combined efforts of most other couples, the pair still find time to exercise together outside of work. From jogging to swimming, the couple says that they treat their fitness routines as opportunities to spend quality time with each other, and Tawfiq finds that this “makes the activities more fun for the both of [them] and enables them to connect with each other on a new level”.
With such an involved fitness schedule, one would assume that work would end up coming home with them, but Tawfiq assures us that the running shoes are left at the front door and it’s then all about family. Of course, if any loved ones come asking for some fitness advice, they’re abs-olutely happy to provide them with an incredibly toned leg up.
And as for their own plans for Valentine’s Day? “Of course it will be a cheat day!” Naila exclaimed. “I’m planning to cook Tawfiq’s favourite Malay dish sambal goreng! I’m learning the recipe from my aunt and I’ve never tried cooking it before so fingers crossed that it tastes good!”
